More important than infrastructure and 'clean water' is the 'justice system.' This is why most of the 'middle class' have fled from Iraq and become penniless REFUGEES. The grade of the U.S. "justice system" is a D. That's my opinion; you supply the scale of the grade. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/28/us/28judges.html?hp=&pagewanted=print The New York Times March 28, 2009 Despite Red Flags About Judges, a Kickback Scheme Flourished By IAN URBINA WILKES-BARRE, Pa. Things were different in the Luzerne County juvenile courtroom, and everyone knew it. Proceedings on average took less than two minutes. Detention center workers were told in advance how many juveniles to expect at the end of each day even before hearings to determine their innocence or guilt. Lawyers told families not to bother hiring them. They would not be allowed to speak anyway. EVERYBODY KNEW IT! Conspiracy, RICCO racketeer, NO ONE INCLUDING JUDGES ARE ABOVE THE LAW. Judges destroy innocent children, which is against ALL RELIGIONS. “The judge’s whim is all that mattered in that courtroom, said Marsha Levick, the legal director of the Juvenile Law Center, a child advocacy organization in Philadelphia, which began raising concerns about the court to state authorities in 1999. The law was basically irrelevant. Last month, the law caught up with Judge Mark A. Ciavarella Jr., 58, who ran that juvenile court for 12 years, and Judge Michael T. Conahan, 56, a colleague on the county’s Court of Common Pleas. In what authorities are calling the biggest legal scandal in state history, the two judges pleaded guilty to tax evasion and wire fraud in a scheme that involved sending thousands of juveniles to two private detention centers in exchange for $2.6 million in kickbacks. On Thursday, the State Supreme Court ordered that the records be cleaned for hundreds of the 2,500 or so juveniles sentenced by Judge Ciavarella, and in the coming weeks, the two judges will be sentenced, under a plea agreement, to more than seven years in prison. Old Friends Hatch a Plan Robert J. Powell, a wealthy personal-injury lawyer from Hazleton and longtime friend of Judge Conahan, wanted to know how he might get a contract to build a private detention center. Judge Ciavarella thought he could help. First, Judge Ciavarella put Mr. Powell in touch with a developer who also happened to be an old friend, Robert K. Mericle, to start work on finding a site. Then, in January 2002 — the month Judge Conahan became president judge, giving him control of the courthouse budget — he signed a secret deal with Mr. Powell, agreeing that the court would pay $1.3 million in annual rent, on top of the tens of millions of dollars that the county and the state would pay to house the delinquent juveniles. And by the end of that year, Judge Conahan had gotten rid of the competition by eliminating financing for the county detention center. They were unstoppable, said Judge Chester B. Muroski, who sent a letter to county commissioners raising concerns about detention costs, only to be transferred days later to another court by Judge Conahan. I knew something was wrong, but they silenced all dissent.
Who blew the whistle? When the county controller, Steve Flood, leaked a state audit that described the state’s lease of the center as a bad deal, the center’s owner filed a “trade secrets” lawsuit against Mr. Flood, and Judge Conahan sealed the suit to limit other documents’ getting out. His decision was later overturned. Omerta - The Code of Silence - Used by the Mafia and the NAMED judges. Everyone began to assume that the judges had some vested interest in the private center because they were pushing it so doggedly, one courthouse worker said. Virtually all former colleagues and courthouse workers would not allow themselves to be identified because the federal investigation into the kickback scheme was continuing and they feared for their jobs if they alienated former allies of the judges. Blackmail, Retaliation, Extortion for job possibly? Many involved get off scot free and HAVE NOT EVEN BEEN CHARGED Mr. Powell has not been charged. His lawyer said that the judges had coerced him into paying the kickbacks and that he was cooperating with investigators. Simple Red Flag of BIG illegal wealth: One red flag was the 56-foot yacht in front of the judges’ Florida condo, where they and Mr. Powell started spending much of their time. Owned by Mr. Powell, the $1.5 million boat was named the Reel Justice. Why was the ILLEGAL boat named "Reel Justice"? The children are called fish. The judge reels them in and throws them in prison. This will condemn them to a life of slavery. America fought the civil war over one form of slavery. The neighbors find Judge Conahan to be SECRETIVE and even STRANGE? By contrast, Judge Conahan was known for being quiet, even secretive, on and off the bench. His neighbors observed that in a community known for holiday parties and open houses, no one they knew had ever seen the inside of Judge Conahan’s house. Is Judge Conahan hiding something REALLY EVIL IN HIS HOUSE? Absolute power corrupts absolutely: the LEGAL WAR BETWEEN Pennsylvania and Florida. Mr. Powell got into a dispute with marina officials who wanted to end his slip lease. Mr. Powell went to court to force the marina to let him keep his boat there, but he filed his motion in Luzerne County, not Florida. A colleague of Judge Conahan and Judge Ciavarella ruled in favor of Mr. Powell, despite a protest from the marina’s lawyer that the case should have been heard in Florida and that he could not attend the hearing because he had been given only one day’s notice. LET JUDGES TELL OTHER STATES THAT PENNSYLVANIA IS SUPREME! Making Sworn State Troopers into Perjurers Sometimes, he helped his friends, too. One courthouse worker recounted seeing a high school friend appear before Judge Ciavarella on a speeding charge. When the state trooper testified that he had clocked the man going 80 in a 55-mile-per-hour zone, the judge interrupted. No, I think he was just going 60. Matter closed, the worker recalled the judge saying. Shocked, the trooper turned to face the judge. You’re dismissed,” the judge said. Strange Prison Planet Created in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania While judges elsewhere in the state were shifting away from incarcerating juveniles for delinquency, Luzerne County was becoming infamous for imposing heavy sentences for minor infractions. DayQuawn Johnson was 13 when he was sent to a detention center for
several days in 2006 for failing to appear at a hearing as a witness to a fight, even though his family had never been notified about the hearing and he had already told school officials that he had not seen anything. Both juveniles were first-time offenders. Public Confession to Violating the Constitution Asked last year why he did not make a habit of telling juveniles of their right to a lawyer before hearings, Judge Ciavarella said, I just don’t believe I have to spoon-feed people to do things in their life. Judge Ciavarella Lied to Reporters After the Juvenile Law Center appealed a case involving a child who was sentenced without a lawyer, Judge Ciavarella told reporters in 2000 that he would avoid letting juveniles appear without counsel in the future. But state data indicate that the problem only worsened. From 1997 to 2003, juveniles appeared before Judge Ciavarella without counsel at more than five times the state average, and from 2003 through 2007, that rate was around 10 times the state average. Bad, incompetent Crooks at Fraudulent Billing of Government State Department of Public Welfare auditors in 2003, when they noticed that the county was billing the state for the same amount every month for detention services. In most other counties, the bill fluctuates based on the changing numbers of juvenile offenders each month. ++++++++ http://engforum.pravda.ru/showthread.php?t=242089 The United States,land of the free has five percent of the world’s population, but it also, thanks to the lobbyists and officiants behind the prison-industrial complex, shamefully holds 25 percent of the world’s incarcerated. Harvey Silverglate is a criminal defense,civil-liberties lawyer and writer. next book, Three Felonies a Day: How the Feds Target the Innocent. No, Mr. Bush, this is not a nation of laws. This is a nation of freedom, where one's propriety is determined ultimately by peer review. Nazi Germany was a nation of laws. +++++++ Current TV on cable, sponsored by google.com http://current.com/topics/87879661/prison_industrial_complex/default/0.htm Prison Industrial Complex +++++++ http://engforum.pravda.ru/showthread.php?t=242090 NEW YORK (Reuters Health) In a survey of a random sample of U.S. emergency physicians, virtually all said they believed that law enforcement officers use excessive force to arrest and detain suspects. +++++++